Sunday, September 28, 2014

Nightingale Nurses and Nightingale Sisters




About the Book:
To the student nurses at The Nightingale hospital, the ward sisters are heartless and frightening, with impossibly high standards. But the sisters have troubles of their own...

Violet
The new night sister is not all that she seems. Who is she and what dark secret is she hiding? As the mystery deepens, Sister Wren is determined to find out the truth.

Dora
The student nurse is struggling with her own secret, and with her heartbreak over Nick, the man who got away. A new arrival on the ward brings the chance to put a smile back on her face. But can she really get over Nick so easily?

Millie
Dora's fellow student is also torn between the two men in her life. But then an unexpected friendship with an elderly patient makes her question where her heart - and her future - really lies.

As the nation mourns the death of King George V, it seems as if nothing is ever going to be the same again, especially for the women at the Nightingale.



About the Book:
'Pay attention please, nurses. The next six months will be the most important of your lives'

It's the final year of training for three young nurses at The Nightingale Hospital.  Helen is at a crossroads in her life as she battles with her domineering mother over both her love life and her future career.  Dora can't stop loving Nick, who is married to her best friend, Ruby. But Ruby is hiding a dark secret with the potential to destroy Ruby's marriage.  Millie is anxious about her fiance, sent to Spain to cover the Civil War, and things only get worse when she encounters a fortune teller who gives her a sinister warning.  With war looming in Europe, and the East End of London squaring up to the threat of Oswald Mosley's blackshirts, the women of the Nightingale have to face their own challenges, at work and in love.

My Comments:
These books are volumes two and three in the soap operaish saga of student nurses and others in a London hospital in the 1930's.  Like any good soap opera these stories include love, deception, romance, hatred, violence and violation and characters whose lives intertwine in ways they would never imagine.  These books are also a fascinating look at London in the 1930's, both the medical aspect (which I find especially interesting) and the general society.  

I'd like to thank the publisher for making review copies available via NetGalley.  Grade:  B.

Saturday, September 27, 2014

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival


Hello, and welcome to Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. We are a group of Catholic bloggers who gather weekly to share our best posts with each other. To participate, go to your blog and create a post titled Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. In it, discuss and link to your posts for the week--whether they deal with theology, Catholic living or cute Catholic kids. I'm mostly a book blogger so my posts are generally book reviews, some Catholic, some not. Make sure that post links back here. Once you publish it, come back here and leave a link below.

We also have a yahoogroup; signing up for it will get you one weekly reminder to post. Click here to sign up.

Name and link to two Catholic blogs you really enjoy. If the bloggers don't participate in Sunday Snippets, invite them to join us!

Nicola at Back to Books is a Catholic book blogger. Kathleen joins us at Sunday Snippets pretty regularly; she blogs here.

This week I reviewed Whiny Whiny Rhino and I linked to a post I wrote about Banned Books.  





Friday, September 26, 2014

Book Tour: Whiny Whiny Rhino


Whiny Whiny Rhino

About the Book:
Can Tiny Tiny Rhino have a fun day?
Or will all of his whining get in the way?
If you've ever been worried to try something new,
then Whiny Whiny Rhino is the book for you!

From creative team McBoop, comes the story of a whiny rhino with a big head and an even bigger imagination.

My Comments:
I loved this!  It is going in my Girl Scout bag to read to the girls when we earn our "Courageous and Strong" petal.  Written in iambic pentameter, Whiny Whiny Rhino follows the youngest Rhino in a family who listens to his older brothers tease him as he leaves the house, but who then  refuses to do all the things his friends invite him to because of fear.  Finally he realizes that the one keeping him from having fun is himself and he goes out to play with the other kids.  

I'd like to thank the publisher for making a review copy available via iRead Book Tours.  Grade:  A. 

Monday, September 22, 2014

Banned Books Week: My Take

I wrote about this several years ago, and since my opinion hasn't changed, I'll just drop a link. http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/2011/09/banned-books-week-another-opinion.html

Saturday, September 20, 2014

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival


Hello, and welcome to Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. We are a group of Catholic bloggers who gather weekly to share our best posts with each other. To participate, go to your blog and create a post titled Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. In it, discuss and link to your posts for the week--whether they deal with theology, Catholic living or cute Catholic kids. I'm mostly a book blogger so my posts are generally book reviews, some Catholic, some not. Make sure that post links back here. Once you publish it, come back here and leave a link below.


We also have a yahoogroup; signing up for it will get you one weekly reminder to post. Click here to sign up.

Question of the week:  What is your favorite formal (memorized) prayer?

My Answer:  The Memorare.

I have two book reviews this week, and I'd really like to get some comments on both of them.  The Lies We Tell Ourselves is the story of school integration in a small Virginia town, and yet is is more.  The Things Lily Knew continues the story of Lily, a woman with Down's Syndrome.  I've reviewed three other books about her in the past and highly recommend all of them.  

Review: The Things Lily Knew



About the Book:
A brilliant Rhodes Scholar whose love life is torn in threes, Annabel Greeley is not lacking in wit or intellect. But when the accomplished geneticist is faced with a decision that will change not only her life, but the future of humanity, the answers elude her. She is hounded by the ever-present and unavoidable fact that she would not be alive if it weren't for her Aunt Lily, who happened to have Down syndrome and, seemingly, all of life's answers. Annabel's life is about to change in profound and paradoxical ways as she sets out in search of the things Lily knew.

My Comments:
If you click on Sherry Boas' name in the tags under this post you can read my reviews of the first three "Lily" books.  Lily had Down's Syndrome and these books tell the story of her life and how her life affected her family.  Now it is years after Lily's death and her niece, Annabel is a geneticist who has been offered the chance to work on a project that could eliminate birth defects--not by the common practice of aborting "defective" babies but by causing a woman's body to eliminate genetically defective eggs so that those babies would never be conceived.  Annabel spends much of the book trying to decide if that is a good idea, and her family's memories of her great-aunt Lily play a part in her decision.

Annabel has two guys who want her and the book is also about the love life of this thirty-something woman.  She feels intense attraction to a guy who has hurt her and is somewhat indifferent to a guy whose goal in life is to make her happy?  Which will she choose, and why?

I like Boas' writing.  While this is clearly an "issue" book it is also a good story that is beautifully written.  The characters are Catholic and while that plays a part in the book, the reader isn't hit over the head with religious doctrine.  It is a short book that I think is a worthwhile read.  Grade B+.

I'd like to thank the author and Catholic Word publishing group for providing a review copy of this book.

Question for My Readers:  If adults could take pre-conception pills to eliminate defective eggs or sperm, would that be a good thing?  I'm not talking about something that would hurt an already conceived zygote, embryo or fetus; rather this hypothetical drug would work on gametes (eggs and sperm).  

Friday, September 19, 2014

Review: Lies We Tell Ourselves

Lies We Tell Ourselves (Harlequin Teen)

About the Book:
In 1959 Virginia, the lives of two girls on opposite sides of the battle for civil rights will be changed forever. 

Sarah Dunbar is one of the first black students to attend the previously all-white Jefferson High School. An honors student at her old school, she is put into remedial classes, spit on and tormented daily. 

Linda Hairston is the daughter of one of the town's most vocal opponents of school integration. She has been taught all her life that the races should be kept "separate but equal." 

Forced to work together on a school project, Sarah and Linda must confront harsh truths about race, power and how they really feel about one another. 

Boldly realistic and emotionally compelling, Lies We Tell Ourselves is a brave and stunning novel about finding truth amid the lies, and finding your voice even when others are determined to silence it.

My Comments:
Interesting book.  I've heard it said that those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.  Robin Talley is using this story of school integration  in 1959 in a small Virginia town to reflect today's debate on gay rights.  The basic story is simple--after much court wrangling and much posturing by the Whites in power, a small handful of Negro students are starting at the local White high school.  They are abused by students and faculty alike and generally have a miserable year.  However, at some point Sarah is assigned to work with two White girls, who happen to be best friends, on a project.  Sarah and one of the girls develop crushes on each other and actually end up kissing.  Neither of them understand why they did it, both feel like it is wrong.  Neither seems to be able to forget it.  Both know they don't want others to know.  While the homosexual plot line is not a major part of the story, having it there at all changes this book from being one about a time in history to being one that says history is repeating itself.  

Linda is the daughter of the town's newspaper editor, and she is a writer for the school newspaper.  She sees herself as reasonable, not filled with hate.  She doesn't throw spitballs or physically threaten or abuse people, even Negros.  However, she buys hook, line and sinker into the idea that "they" are different from "us"' that "we" have the right not to associate with "them", that letting "them" into "our" schools will lower the standards.  As she gets to know Sarah she has to confront the fact that Sarah is smart, dignified, and has to deal with a lot of abuse.  Still, she doesn't understand why Sarah and her kind don't just stay on their end of town.  She is surprised when told how much better supplied her high school is than the high school for Negros.  She can't believe that Sarah's house is much like her own.  

Robin Talley is obviously trying to suggest that today's battle for gay rights is simply a repeat of the 1950's and 1960's battle for civil rights for African-Americans.  Characters put forth religious reasons for promoting segregation.  Taking things slowly and not pushing for too much change too fast is mentioned.  That Talley considers the situations to be parallel is obvious.

As a parent one thing that struck me was sacrifice of individual children for a greater good.  It seems obvious to me that the African-American teens in this book would have been better off staying in their school.  Sarah and her compatriots gave up a normal senior year of high school in which they would have been the campus leaders, in which they would have been prom queens, cheerleaders, debate team members and more to come to a school where they were clearly not wanted and where they were treated as second-class citizens.   However, without a first wave of students integrating schools there would not have been a second wave, and integration would never have come if the welfare of each individual student had been the determinant of whether she or he would be an integration leader.  Sarah and her sister did not choose to integrate that school--their parents decided that their children would do so.  As parents, what is our duty to our children--to put them in the situation that is best for them or to put them in the situation that is best for society as a whole?

The chapters are titled with the name of the character from whose point of view the action is viewed.  Sometimes I would lose track of who was who, especially between Linda and her friend Judy.  While Sarah was a strong character with a clearly defined personality and role, the separation between Linda and Judy didn't really become clear in my mind until almost the end of the book.  They were, in my mind, the White girls working on the project with Sarah.

I'd like to thank the publisher for making a review copy available via NetGalley.  You can preorder on Amazon now (Lies We Tell Ourselves (Harlequin Teen) ) ; the release date is September 30.  Grade:  B+


Saturday, September 13, 2014

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival


Hello, and welcome to Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. We are a group of Catholic bloggers who gather weekly to share our best posts with each other. To participate, go to your blog and create a post titled Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. In it, discuss and link to your posts for the week--whether they deal with theology, Catholic living or cute Catholic kids. I'm mostly a book blogger so my posts are generally book reviews, some Catholic, some not. Make sure that post links back here. Once you publish it, come back here and leave a link below.


We also have a yahoogroup; signing up for it will get you one weekly reminder to post. Click here to sign up.

Question of the week:With which ministries/activities within your parish are you involved?  I am a lector, I serve on the school board and as the parent of a child in the parish school, I'm in the Parents' Club.  I work the fair every year and I'm usually there all day for the craft fair.  

No posts for me this week.  Maybe next week.

Saturday, September 06, 2014

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival


Hello, and welcome to Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. We are a group of Catholic bloggers who gather weekly to share our best posts with each other. To participate, go to your blog and create a post titled Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival. In it, discuss and link to your posts for the week--whether they deal with theology, Catholic living or cute Catholic kids. I'm mostly a book blogger so my posts are generally book reviews, some Catholic, some not. Make sure that post links back here. Once you publish it, come back here and leave a link below.


We also have a yahoogroup; signing up for it will get you one weekly reminder to post. Click here to sign up.

Question of the week:  What is your favorite hymn or song you hear at Mass?  I have a bunch but Amazing Grace  and How Great Thou Art are right up at the top of the list.  

This week I reviewed Patrick Madrid's latest book:  Why Be Catholic?  I wrote about my continuing experience investing with Lending Club.  I reviewed a Christian novel that looks at roles in marriage.   Finally, I reviewed a book about student nurses in the 1930's.     

Review: Why Be Catholic?




About the Book:
Growing up Catholic during a time of great social and theological upheaval and transition, a time in which countless Catholics abandoned their religion in search of something else, Patrick Madrid learned a great deal about why people leave Catholicism and why others stay. This experience helped him gain many insights into what it is about the Catholic Church that some people reject, as well as those things that others treasure. Drawing upon Madrid's personal experiences, Why Be Catholic? offers a deeply personal, fact-based, rationale for why everyone should be Catholic or at least consider the Catholic Church in a new light.

My Comments:
Why be Catholic?  The bottom line for Madrid is that the Catholic Church teaches the truth so truth-seekers should be part of the Catholic Church.  

Madrid relates the tale of his  high school girlfriend's father who never missed a chance to tell Madrid what was wrong with Catholic beliefs.  Madrid would go home, look up what he was told, and learn that there was a supportable reason the Church taught what it did.  An apologist was born.  

In this book Madrid addresses the sacraments--what they do, why we need them and why God chooses to relate to us in those ways.  He talks about Mary and her place in the plan for salvation.  The saints and their roles are also addressed.  Madrid uses scripture and the writings of the early Church Fathers to explain and defend the teachings of the Catholic Church.

Those looking for an intellectual approach to faith will find this a readable convincing text.  Those who choose their faith based on emotion will not likely be convinced, though I did like his story about a woman who left the Church based on a priest not being there when she needed him, and how God, with Madrid's help, brought her home.  

I'd like to thank the publisher for making a review copy available via NetGalley.  Grade:  B+

Lending Club: Month 2

It  has been almost two months since I started investing with Lending Club.  Here is how they say I am doing:


Not to shabby, right?  Not too shabby, but not as good as it looks.  As you may recall, I started this experiment in July by depositing $1000.00 with Lending Club.  I invested half of it in new loans, in $25 increments, and the other half in notes people were selling on the resale market.  See this post for and explanation of the advantages of each, per my research.  

At this point my Lending Club account is part investment, part experiment and part toy.  I ran out of money to play with so I decided to invest another $1550.00 (so I was over the minimum limit for automatic investing).  Now, some of you can do math, and will look at the graphic above and wonder how to start with $2550.00, earn $22.09, and end up with $2525.75.  Well, here is how.  (you can click on the picture for a better view.


This is one experiment.  You'll see that all the notes on this list have interest rates in excess of 20%.  I bought them all on the secondary market and all are over a year old, and all have perfect payment records.  While there is no guarantee that these borrowers will not default, the risk is quite a bit less than it was a year ago.  Most notes that default do so before month 18, and start showing signs of trouble (lowered FICO score, late or missed payments) before month 12.  Most borrowers holding high interest rate notes with good payment records know they are in demand and if they sell them, they demand a premium.  For this portfolio, I paid the premium, figuring that if I got 20% interest, what did I care what the seller made.  Then I had a loan paid off early, and I lost a few cents on that deal.  I'm going to watch this portfolio for a while.  Nickel Steamroller is a website that crunches the data they get from Lending Club.  They show that, depending on the grade of the loan, somewhere between 25% and 50% of the loans are paid early, though they don't show how early.  If you add the amount in the "payments" column to the "outstanding principal" column, you'll see whether I am ahead or behind for that note after one payment.  Generally speaking, I'm still behind.  

From what I've read, the most accurate way to compute your returns on peer lending is called XIRR.  You have to account for money in and money out and the fact that each note has a different interest rate.  A calculator is here.  Right now it is showing annualized losses on this portfolio of 36.57%.  If I can avoid defaults for a couple of months, that number should improve greatly.  

What about the rest of my notes?  Well, this portfolio is new notes I bought with the first batch of money.  Since I deposited the money July 10, that's the starting date I'm going to use.

If you look at the diagram, you'll see that it lists my weighted average interest rate as 13.6% but when I calculate the returns with XIRR, I only get 6.7%.  Why?  Because it took me almost a month to invest all that money.  Until that time, it sat in a no interest account.  I expect this number to get better before it gets worse.


This portfolio started with $516.95 worth of resale notes.  The nice thing about them is that you do not have to wait an entire month (or more) before getting interest.  If you own it on the day interest is paid, you get the money.  On this portfolio, I have returns of 13.53%.


This is my discount portfolio.  I went looking for notes that were selling at a discount, but which were a year old (about) and had perfect payment records.  I invested $378.57 and got 20 notes.  The yield to maturity shown for most of them was between 4 and 6 percent.  I'm showing a return of 6.08% but that counts the discount as interest.  Also, many of the notes paid their former owner, not me, this month.  It will be interesting to see what happens to that number.  

One question with any investment is "How does this fit into my overall plan?"  Is this for long-term money, or short term?  Is this a safe investment, or risky?  How does it compare to others?  From what I've been reading, my discount portfolio is pretty safe.  The notes are past the time of most defaults, and they were high quality notes to start with.  We like to keep enough cash around for a new used car if necessary.  I'm wondering if putting that money in high quality notes with principal values near $10 would be a good place for that money.  One difference between these notes and stocks/bonds/mutual funds is that these notes throw off a lot of cash (principal and interest).  You can see at the top that I've gotten $97.54 in payments in the last two months.  If all the notes I have pay, I'll get $96.86 deposited into my account each month until one of these notes is paid, or quits paying. If I had more smaller notes, there would be even more cash generated from the same principal.  Between that cash flow, and being able to sell notes, I wonder if this would be safe enough for that money.  The interest sure beats what the bank is paying.  

So, what do you think?  Will I get rich with this?  Should I invest more money; get out while the getting is good, or just watch things a while longer?

Tuesday, September 02, 2014

Blog Tour: Home to Chicory Lane With Facebook Party and Giveaway!




About the Book:
Audrey Whitman’s dreams are coming true. Now that their five kids are grown, she and her husband Grant are turning their beloved family home into a cozy bed and breakfast, just a mile outside of Langhorne, Missouri.

Opening weekend makes Audrey anxious, with family and friends coming from all over to help celebrate the occasion. But when Audrey’s daughter, Landyn, arrives, the U-Haul she’s pulling makes it clear she’s not just here for a few days. Audrey immediately has questions. What happened in New York that sent Landyn running home? Where was Landyn’s husband, Chase? And what else was her daughter not telling her? One thing was for sure, the Chicory Inn was off to a rocky start. Can Audrey still realize her dream and at the same time provide the comfort of home her daughter so desperately needs?

My Comments:
Those who like their Christian fiction on the religious side should enjoy this novel about two newlyweds working out the terms of their relationship.  Those holding more modern egalitarian views of marriage will shake their heads at references to the husband being the head of the home and at marriage vows of obedience.  Both Landyn and Chase are trying to listen to God in their lives and yet they aren't listening to each other.  Frankly Landyn really needs to grow up; she gets mad (rightly so) because her husband makes a major life decision without consulting her, so she quits her job and runs home to Mom and Dad where she acts like a teenager when asked to help with chores.  She refuses to answer her phone or check her messages because she doesn't want people telling her what to do.  

Deborah Raney does a good job of contrasting the broken marriage and immature ways of relating that Chase and Landyn have adopted to the mature and loving marriage of Landyn's parents.  This is clearly a book written to teach a lesson about marriage.

I'd like to thank Litfuse for providing a complimentary review copy.  Grade:  B.

Blog Tour:

The first book in Deborah Raney's new Chicory Inn series, Home to Chicory Lane, introduces us to Audrey Whitman, a mother who has launched all her children into life and now looks forward to fulfilling some of her own dreams during her empty-nest years. However, not all of her children are ready to stay out of the nest quite yet.

Deborah is celebrating the release of her new series with a $200 B&B Weekend Getaway and a Facebook author chat party.

chicory-400-click
 
  One winner will receive:
  • A B&B Weekend Getaway (via a $200 Visa cash card)
  • Home to Chicory Lane by Deborah Raney
Enter today by clicking one of the icons below. But hurry, the giveaway ends on September 9th. Winner will be announced at the Home to Chicory Lane Author Chat Party on 9/9. Deborah will be hosting a heartfelt book chat, giving away prizes, and answering questions from readers. She will also share an exclusive sneak peek at the next book in the Chicory Inn series!

So grab your copy of Home to Chicory Lane and join Deborah on the evening of September 9th for a chance to connect and make some new friends. (If you haven't read the book, don't let that stop you from coming!)

Don't miss a moment of the fun; RSVP todayTell your friends via FACEBOOK or TWITTER and increase your chances of winning. Hope to see you on the 9th!


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